Orkut is by far, the most popular network in Brazil and has recently been topped by Facebook in India. Given the population of India, its user’s base can be estimated at quite a few million.

However, Facebook’s growth in India has been a threat to Orkut and to attract new users and possibly bring back old ones, it has started a system of badges. In the midst of all the spam and fraud, whether the system will be effective is a huge question. However, it does justice to one aspect of social networks. When on social networks, there is one thing people love to do and it is called “showing off”.

Orkut badges let you show off in the best way possible. There are badges for Early users, Trend Setters, Graduates and Strong Contributors. Other badges might show up soon and this is a good start. However, if you want to see a badge system done correctly, look at this Stack Overflow badge system.

This might not interest some, as it is all geek stuff. However, the badges are all justified according to behavior and Orkut can learn from this.

Chinmoy Kanjilal is a FOSS enthusiast and evangelist. He is passionate about Android. Security exploits turn him on and he loves to tinker with computer networks. He rants occasionally at Techarraz.com. You can connect with him on Twitter @ckandroid.